


forgive me that i live

by chameleonchanging



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:48:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24273085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chameleonchanging/pseuds/chameleonchanging
Summary: Plo survives Order 66. Wolffe doesn't.Obi-Wan chats with Plo about that before they go their separate ways to stop the Sith.
Relationships: Plo Koon/CC-3636 | Wolffe
Comments: 13
Kudos: 96





	forgive me that i live

When the order comes, Plo is on the ground, Wolffe and his Pack at his back as they sweep the field for any straggling droids that may be waiting in ambush. The Force screams a warning and he begins to turn - and then Wolffe is tackling him to the side as blaster bolts pepper the space he had just been occupying. Wolffe returns fire, catching Sinker and Comet in the gut and Boost in the head, and then he turns to face Plo, clutching at his skull in terrible pain. 

“What - _Why_?” Plo asks, staring up at him in horrified shock. “Wolffe, why?”

“It’s getting me too,” Wolffe gasps. “Plo - run - good soldiers - the Chancellor did this to us. I’m so sorry. _I’m so sorry._ ” 

Plo scrambles towards him, but too late. Wolffe jams the barrel of his pistol under his chin and squeezes the trigger. His body collapses in a heap, smoking from the neck. 

Plo can’t bear to look. He can only weep on his knees as death washes over him from across the stars. 

* * *

Obi-Wan thinks Wolffe was able to resist those precious few moments because of the injury that took his eye. Plo doesn’t really care. He doesn’t have it in him to care about anything anymore. He’s a Kel Dor; his entire species is dependent on their connections to others, and Plo’s entire web has been set aflame. The only two strands left are Obi-Wan and Master Yoda, and he only knows they remain because they stand beside him. The Order is gone. Mace is gone. His Pack is dead by their Commander’s hand, and Wolffe - 

Everything is constant pain, now, and he’s drowning. If ever there was something other than the pain, he can’t find it. He’s dragged himself through the process of taking back the Temple, seen the recording of Skywalker in the creche, and now he’s putting one foot in front of the other on the way to the Senate.

“Plo,” Obi-Wan says, “wait.”

“There’s nothing to wait for,” he says dully. _The Chancellor did this to us._ “We know what must be done.”

“You need a better plan than to just - show up! You know what happened!” Obi-Wan pulls at his shoulder, and Plo halts, too tired to fight him.

“Master Yoda will be with me,” he says. “We will stop Palpatine.”

“You’re not going to stop Palpatine!” Obi-Wan snaps. “You’re going so you can die!”

“And what if I am?” There is a void in his mind where ten thousand voices used to sit. There is a wound where Wolffe had torn his mind away by violence. He’s aware that he’s depressed and borderline catatonic. He knows that he should probably be on watch. But this is the war of the end times, and there is no room to breathe or grieve. 

_I’m so sorry._

He was too afraid to look at what was left of Wolffe, even as he’d set him upon his pyre. It was an act of cowardice Wolffe would never have allowed. When he passes into the Force - soon, soon, let it be soon - he won’t have even that much. He doesn’t care about that either. 

“You loved your Commander,” Obi-Wan says.

“Yes.”

“You killed him.” 

“No,” Plo says. “He killed himself. To spare me.” He runs his hands over his bracers, over his beloved’s sigil, drawing strength from the image. There is a gash through the wolf’s eye. “He shouldn’t have. I don’t have long to live anyway.” 

The psychic damage is too great. He can already feel himself slipping. If it had only been Wolffe, only his Pack; or if it had been the Order, and his Pack remained - but losing both at the same time is more than he can handle. This time next month, there won’t be anything of him left, just a puppet waiting to be put out of its misery. From that perspective, he’s not looking to die. Not really. He’s just trying to make the most of the time he has left.

It’s not an excuse that would have worked on Wolffe, but Wolffe lost veto rights when he put a blaster to his head. 

“I’m not - being dramatic, Obi-Wan,” says Plo. “I’m not giving up. This isn’t a survivable injury. No Kel Dor has, and no Kel Dor ever will survive something of this magnitude. Do you understand? If we win - if Palpatine dies, if Skywalker somehow comes back to the light, I will still become a drooling, comatose, reanimated corpse. There isn’t time for me to rebuild the connections I need.” He stares at his lightsaber in his hands. Wolffe’s lightsaber, his first, yellow-bladed. It’s pleased to be with him again. It grieves Wolffe’s loss. “If I could - If I could choose -”

“Master Plo. Master Obi-Wan,” Yoda says, accompanied by the click of his cane. “Soon, depart we must.”

“It would be easier to let it happen,” Plo says quietly. “But a Jedi does not take the easier route simply because it is easier, and a Mando doesn’t die on his knees.” He dips his head. “I’m doing the best I can. That’s all anyone can ask for. Goodbye, Obi-Wan. May the Force be with you.”

And he marches on.


End file.
